Reigning champions Duncan Vos and Ralph Pitchford showed their class with a come-from-behind win in their Donaldson Nissan Navara in the Eastern Cape 400, round two of the Absa SA Off Road Championship, which finished in Jeffreys Bay on Saturday afternoon.
It was their second win in a row and extended Nissan’s winning streak to a record eight victories since the same event last year. The Nissan Motorsport pair finished the 400-km event in a time of 8h 12m 56s, taking the chequered flag 13m 5s ahead of the factory Ford Ranger of Thomas Rundle and Hennie ter Stege. The Norwegian/British pairing of Ivar Erik Tollefsen and Quin Evans in a second Donaldson Nissan Navara was third, 1m 52s behind the Ford, despite completing most of the second half of Saturday’s route without rear brakes.
Gary Bertholdt and Andre Vermeulen (Toyota Hilux) were fourth ahead of the similar vehicle of Chris Visser and Japie Badenhorst. The top five were all competing in the premier SP class.
Vos and Pitchford had to work hard for their win. After dominating Friday’s 60-km prologue and leading the field from the start on Saturday morning, they were halted just 15 min into the route with brake problems. Pitchford, a trained mechanic who has prepared and serviced bikes and cars for the Dakar Rally, fixed the problem on the side of the road and the pair rejoined the race some eight minutes later in 25th position among the combined production and special vehicles.
Vos’s team-mates former champion Hannes Grobler and defending co-drivers’ champion Mohr, who started the race in fourth place, took over the lead in their Donaldson Nissan Navara after Vos stopped and were the first production car into the compulsory halfway service stop. Chasing their first win of the year, they were forced to call it a day on the second loop with gearbox problems.
By the time Vos and Pitchford reached the halfway stop they had worked their way into fourth overall in the production vehicle category, behind Grobler and Mohr, Hugo and Jaap de Bruyn (Toyota Hilux) and Hein Lategan/Chris Birkin (Toyota Hilux).
“It was a tough race,” said a weary Vos at the finish. “We had to work really hard to catch up with the leaders after our unscheduled stop. It was not easy in the dust and there was always the danger of picking up a puncture or damaging the car when we overtook the cars in front of us. On top of it all, I experienced car sickness. Ralph was a star fixing our problem. The car is really strong and once we took over the lead we were able to ease off a little to the finish.”
Nissan privateers Terence Marsh and Pieter Groenewald (Regent Racing Navara) were out of luck. They were unable to continue after damaging a wheel on the ex-factory car when they hit a rock.
Reigning class D champions Coetzee Labuscagne and Johan Gerber (Raysonics Nissan Hardbody) were also non-finishers after experiencing engine problems.
Former circuit racing and international karting champion Leeroy Poulter and Rob Howie again impressed in their class E Nissan Hardbody prepared by Nissan Motorsport. In only their second event together, they too were out of luck and had to retire at the halfway point with broken front suspension.
Glyn Hall, general manager of Nissan Motorsport: “Duncan and Ralph did very well to recover and win this event. It was another tough test for all the crews, with only 25 of the 56 starters able to reach the finish. We had more problems than we would have liked, but first and third overall is a good result at the end of the day.”
Motorsport enjoys a mutually beneficial relationship with Atlas Copco (pneumatic tools), Bosch Automotive, Champion (spark plugs), Donaldson (air filters), Edgecam (machining software specialists), Eibach (springs), Ferodo (brake pads), First Car Rental, LUK (clutches), Mastercraft (tools), Pro Engineering, Sasol Oil (fuels and lubricants) and SKF (bearings).
